Wirceburgenses

WIRCEBURGENSES. - A group of Jesuits, professors at the University of Würzburg, who together compiled the complete course of theology known under the name of Theologia Erbioploensis and more commonly as Theologia Wirceburgensis.

The work was undertaken at the urgent insistence of the prince-bishop, Philipp von Greiffenklau, who had ordered the professors to replace the prevailing custom, too taxing for the hearers, of dictating the lesson, with a textbook. The professors who cooperated in it were Fathers Heinrich Kilber, Thomas Holzlau, Ignaz Neubauer and Oderich Munier, already known for various treatises published previously, which, revised and sometimes modified to adapt them to the purpose of a textbook for the students, were brought together and arranged to form the: Theologia dogmatica, polemica, scholastica et moralis lectionibus academicis accomodata (14 vols., Würzburg 1766-71; 2nd ed., 10 vols., Paris 1852-54; 3rd ed., 10 vols., ibid. 1879-80). In this edition there belong to Fr. Kilber (1710-82) the vols.: I, Principia theologica (Sacred Scripture, Divine Tradition, the Church of Jesus Christ, Councils, the Roman Pontiff, the Holy Fathers, Theology and Canon Law, Reason and History, Heresies, Condemned Propositions), III (God one and triune, Angels, Creation), VII (Sin, Grace, Justification and Merit); VIII (Theological Virtues with an appendix on the Cardinal Virtues, taken from the De justitia et jure of Lessius). Of Fr. Holzlau (1716-83) are the vols.: IV (Incarnation of the Divine Word, with a strong defense of the orthodoxy of Cyril of Alexandria and of Pope Honorius); VI (On Law and Justice, with an appendix on the Virtues of Religion, taken from the aforementioned work of Lessius); IX (Sacraments in general, Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist, with a theological-critical treatise on the works of Dionysius the Areopagite, whose authenticity he admits); X (the second part: Holy Orders and Matrimony). Of Fr. Neubauer are the vols. II, Tractatus de religione (against atheists, polytheists, Mohammedans, Jews, sectarians, especially Bayle, Voltaire, Rousseau); V (Beatitude. Human Acts, Laws). Of Fr. Munier: X (first part: Penance and Extreme Unction). The theological course, which is distinguished for its clarity, order and solidity and gives equal consideration to speculative and positive elements, worthily closing the old theology in Germany and (M. Grabmann, Gesch. der kath. Theologie, Freiburg im Br. 1933, p. 196: Italian version, Milan 1937, p. 273), has always preserved its well-merited fame, even among more recent theologians, such as Scheeben, Hurter, Pesch, Grabmann.

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